


woe betide you

by weatheredlaw



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Brother-Sister Relationships, Character Death, F/M, Found Family, Grief/Mourning, M/M, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-20
Updated: 2017-10-20
Packaged: 2019-01-20 03:56:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,956
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12424539
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/weatheredlaw/pseuds/weatheredlaw
Summary: Sometimes death comes in pairs. The crew of the Starblaster deals with those moments and beyond.





	woe betide you

**Author's Note:**

> this story is based on [this](https://mcgonagollygee.tumblr.com/post/166023033472/so-obviously-its-always-shitty-when-any-of-the) text post, by tumblr user [mcgonagollygee](https://mcgonagollygee.tumblr.com/). for some reason i can't stop writing about death.

_**come the quickening feet that fall  
(magnus & lup)** _

This planet had seen better days.

Merle's immediate impression was that it had been ravaged by storms and decimated by water erosion. The first place they tried to land the _Starblaster_ was weak under her landing gear and gave out under them, so Merle and Barry set out, Magnus and Lup in tow, to try and find a decent place for the ship to land. Merle wasn't exactly comfortable with the way Magnus and Lup jogged ahead to lean over the edge of the cliffside and point down enthusiastically.

“There's _houses_ ,” Magnus called out.

Lup swooned. “ _Ugh_ , and there's totally a place to swim down there.”

“When we're safe,” Merle said. “And you two don't stand so close to the edge. Pan only knows what this place has been through.” He had felt the way the rocks crumbled under his feet. It made him nervous. The first tremor took them all by surprise, but after that, Magnus and Lup stayed close by.

When it happened, they weren't really all that far away, and nowhere near the edge of the cliff. Magnus had almost taken a tumble an hour before, so he was playing it safe. But they'd drifted apart, and Magnus and Lup were inspecting the vines on the trees while Barry and Merle took rock samples to look into later.

The ground trembled again, and this time it started to crack and split. Dust mushroomed into the air, and Merle accidentally took a heaping lungful of it, sending him reeling. So he didn't notice that Magnus and Lup were trying to make their way back, that they were going to make a run for the ship as Barry yanked him to his feet.

“Don't move! I'll get you--”

But the ground shook again and Merle looked up to see their panic stricken faces as the chunk of the cliff they stood on started falling away. They ran and they ran and _they ran_ – Magnus tried to grab Lup and throw her toward the edge, but he was too far, they both missed spectacularly and then the two of them and the rocks all disappeared over the edge.

Barry _bolted._ “ _No!_ ” He stopped just short of tumbling over himself and stared down.

Merle went to stand next to him and watched as the river swallowed everything it could.

“We have to go down, we have to get them--”

“Barry--”

“We'll get the ship, we'll lower it into the canyon--”

“ _Barry!_ ” Merle yanked on his arm and pulled him down to eye-level. “Bud, that's a shear drop.”

“It's Lup, she'll have made it--”

“Barry.” Merle reached up and held the kid's face in his hands. “I'm sorry. _I'm sorry._ ”

Barry jerked from his grasp, but it was half-hearted.

They both knew.

 

* * *

 

They did take the ship to go down and look. Lucretia insisted that if there was...anything left of them, they should give them a proper service.

“Like we always do.”

Merle glanced over at Taako, who was sitting stone-still at the kitchen table, his forehead in his hands. He went over and put a hand on his shoulder, but Taako pulled away, and went into the back of the ship to his room.

Magnus was always better at this, when Lup was gone. For some reason, he and the twins just...clicked. But without him, no one really knew what to say. If it had been just Lup, Magnus would have been leading the search party. He was big on ceremony, big on insisting they pay their respects to one another, even if they knew they'd be back.

And Merle knew, if it was just Magnus who had died, Lup and Taako would be doing that together, teasing the memory of their friend and planning something ridiculous to do so they could tell him later. _We released eight-thousand doves at your funeral, Mags. We cast that tentacle spell at your funeral, big guy. You wouldn't believe it but the whole damn planet turned out to be made of dogs!_

But they were both gone, and it felt...empty, and weird, without them.

When they landed the ship by the river, Davenport decided this was where they'd stay. The ground seemed stable, and there was water right there.

But Magnus and Lup were very much gone, by the time they reached the spot where they'd fallen. Barry and Merle tracked the river down a handful of miles, but it tapered off at a waterfall. Neither wanted to say it out loud, so they simply went back. Davenport placed two markers in the earth by the ship, and that was the best they managed to do.

 

* * *

 

Without his sister, Taako was obviously and sharply alone. He left the ship for hours at a time, only coming back to cook and go to sleep. Merle wasn't even sure he did that. He caught him a few times sitting on the deck of the ship, staring up at the sky. Merle figured the room he shared with Lup was full of her things, smelled like her, took on her essence when she wasn't around. It would have been hard, he thought, to move on from that.

If Magnus had been there, he wouldn't have let the place get too quiet. He'd go out with Taako, insist on learning to cook maybe, and doing it poorly, just to mess with him. But without Magnus, the ship felt a lot like a tomb. And even though they only lost two of them, it wound up feeling like a lot more.

Barry simply wouldn't leave. He stayed in his room and his lab, working pretty much through the year. He would come out to eat every so often, but it wasn't much. Davenport tried to fill the space with talk, but it never seemed to help. And then Lucretia – without Magnus or Lup to pull her out of her shell, she retreated inward, lost sight of everything. That year, no one did much exploring beyond looking for the light, and even then Merle got _lucky_ while he was out collecting leaf samples. He got _damn_ lucky.

 

* * *

 

Merle went up one the deck one night, little over halfway through the year, and found Taako stargazing.

“Hey, bud.”

“Don't tell me you came up here to give me a pep talk, old man.” Taako closed his eyes. “Not really in the mood, you feel me?”

“Oh sure, sure. I just came up to look at the stars. Pretty clear night.”

Taako opened one eye and followed Merle until he sat down. “Yeah,” he said. “It's alright.”

“You spend a lot of time up here?”

“Don't patronize me, you already know.” The other eye opened, and Taako trained his gaze on the stars.

“Right, yeah.” Merle looked up, too. “You know, one thing about all this that's kinda cool?” Taako didn't answer. “We get to see new stars. I don't know, that feels pretty special to me.”

“Yeah,” Taako said. “It's just _swell._ ”

“You know, if you don't give a shit then why are you up here?”

Taako sat up and looked at him. “Because my room fucking sucks. And because Barry's fucking barricaded in his lab, so I can't, like, commiserate with anyone. He's fucking _in love_ with my sister, but he thinks it's some _big secret._ ” He rolled his eyes. “Like I care. And then...and then like, last time Lup was gone, Magnus was here and he'd come up here with me, or I could stay in his room because he has, like, _zero_ concept of personal space.”

“...But he's gone, too.”

“Yeah, _thanks._ ” Taako sighed and laid back down. “It just...fucking _sucks_. The only thing that's sort of okay is--”

“Taako?” They both turned and found Lucretia standing at the top of the stairs, a small stack of books in her hands. “Everything alright?”

“Yeah, it's fine.” He sat up again, and Merle thought, this time, he seemed a little eager. “Merle was just making me feel terrible about everything.”

“I was _not!_ ”

Lucretia smiled. “I'm sure his intentions were good.”

“Good shmood,” Taako muttered.

Merle stood. “Alright, alright. I can figure out when I'm not wanted.” He stepped back as Lucretia came in to fill his place. She settled down and opened a book in her lap as Taako laid back down and looked up at the stars. Merle lingered halfway down the staircase and trained his ear.

“...this one about?”

“It's poetry.”

“ _Ech._ ”

“No, I promise, you'll like it.”

Taako snorted. “Alright, whatever you say.”

Merle heard a few pages turn, and Lucretia's soft voice began to fill the night.

 

* * *

 

It was the only time he saw her come out of her room other than to eat. Eventually, Merle sort of started inviting himself to listen, too. He thought Taako might object, but it was nice, the three of them perched on top of the ship, watching the stars, reading aloud. Eventually, Davenport followed, and one night they even managed to coax Barry from his room.

On the last evening before they knew the year was up, they all laid out on the deck while Lucretia read from another book of poems, and stared up at the sky.

“Thank god this year is over,” Davenport muttered.

“Hear, hear.” Merle nudged him with his shoulder.

Barry, who'd been mostly quiet throughout this, said, “Be nice for a chance of scenery.”

Merle nodded. “Yeah...you know we never did go swimming. Lup said there was a rock pool over there.”

Taako stood and stretched. “Let's do it.”

“I don't have a suit,” Lucretia said. Merle could practically see her flushing in the dark.

“Suits are for squares,” Taako said, and went down the stairs. They followed him off the ship and toward the rock pool, and watched as he took everything off, right there. “What, like you guys haven't seen _this_ before.”

Barry lowered his gaze. “ _Taako_ \--”

“Oh come on, Barold. Merle--” Merle looked up. “You can't tell me you've grown a sense of propriety _now_ , of all times.”

“Heck no,” Merle said, and stripped after him.

 

* * *

 

“ _I missed the skinny dipping?!_ ” Magnus howled, yanking on his hair. “ _I can't believe I missed the skinny dipping!_ ”

“Yeah, it was boss,” Taako said. He'd attached himself to Lup's side and probably wouldn't come away for the rest of the year.

Magnus pointed. “If you tell me that even _Lucretia_ \--”

“She did,” Taako said.

“It's true, I did.”

Lup _fumed._ “I _cannot_ believe you went swimming _naked_ without me.”

“Please say it was just once,” Magnus pleaded. “Just one time.”

“Oh no, homie.” Taako stretched and grinned. “It was like, pretty much every night, am I right, Barold?”

Barry turned a previously undiscovered shade of red and ducked behind his book.

Magnus _balked._ “I _cannot_ believe this.”

Lup pointed. “He's lying, they only did it once.”

“No, no, it was like every single night. We had a fuckin' _blast._ ”

Merle chuckled as they all continued to bicker, heading into the kitchen to get a drink. He found Davenport at the sink, looking out the window at a new sky of stars.

“Everything's back to normal,” Merle said.

“Yeah, but for how long?”

“Hey, there's never been a guarantee, you know that.”

Davenport nodded. “Yeah. Yeah, I do.”

Merle held out a bottle. “Look, it won't do to wallow in it. So just have a beer and listen to the kids fight. It's a good time.”

Davenport chuckled and took the drink. “Alright,” he said. “I'm in.”

 

* * *

 

_**come the gathering rain  
(merle & davenport)** _

“Should we...I mean, does the ship...” Magnus was stammering, trying to fill the space with sound. The stammering became almost like a stutter, and he suddenly couldn't _speak_. Lucretia reached down and took his hand – he was trembling, but a calm seemed to touch him, for a moment, and he went quiet.

Lucretia looked down at the bodies, and wondered if she should have just let him get it out. Losing Merle was one thing. It was _hard_ , it was always hard to lose him. He was just this immovable force. He made you eat when you said you weren't hungry, made you go hiking when you said you just wanted to stay inside. And ordinarily, if anyone else did that, it would set Lucretia's teeth on edge, but – with Merle, it just seemed right.

And Davenport, too – he wouldn't let her stay in her room too long, especially the cycles when Magnus was gone. He'd go in and coax her out, always gently, like maybe it was her idea in the first place. He'd want to see the journals, want to know what she was drawing. Davenport had hand picked them for this mission, and he'd told Lucretia in her interview that he thought she was a talented artist, that she could really capture their quest. So whenever he could, he wanted to see her drawings.

But he was gone.

And so was Merle.

And it felt... _empty._

 

* * *

 

Barry had a terrible habit of shutting down whenever something like this happened. Sometimes Lup could get him to open up, but the day after they buried them, Barry's mouth shut up tight and he didn't say a word for weeks. They'd made it halfway through the year without losing anyone, but they'd also stayed close to the ship. When whatever that _thing_ was that attacked them showed itself, no one knew what to do, and they were down two of their crew before Magnus managed to stick a sword in its face.

But Barry didn't want to explore. He didn't want to figure out what else there was. He moved from his room to his lab to the kitchen in one order or another, and didn't say a word.

Lucretia knew how he felt. When they'd lost Magnus and Lup, she could barely stand to be seen at all. The only thing that got her out was that last month, when she finally managed to go to the deck, and found Taako staring up at the stars. Even then, though, it was hard. The hardest thing she'd had to do in a while.

It didn't feel like her responsibility to coax Barry from his grief. She knew that it would have been easier said than done, and he didn't respond to her the way he did to Lup, or even Taako and Magnus. Lucretia just wasn't... _big_ enough, she supposed. She and Barry were too much alike. If she went to his room, she knew she'd probably wind up staying there alongside him, nose buried in a book as the two of them decidedly did _not_ process what they were feeling.

It was just easier that way.

 

* * *

 

“Alright _enough._ ” Lup _banged_ on Barry's door loud enough to rouse Lucretia, who poked her head out of her room to investigate. “Good, it got you out, too. We're going looking for the light. Magnus was up all night reading about flying the ship. He's in the middle of a power nap, but when he's up we're going scouring.”

“Are you sure--”

“ _Yes._ ” She continued banging on Barry's door until it opened and he stood there, staring. “Come on--”

“I'm not going.”

“Well you'll be on the ship so technically--”

“Then I'll sit outside and wait for you,” Barry said coolly. “But I'm not going.”

“Barold--”

“I don't want to go. I don't want to be talked into going, and I don't want to hear this sound anymore.” He banged on the wall for emphasis. “I told you to leave me alone. I _told you_ that I was upset. I don't want to--”

“Fine.” Lup turned on her heel. “ _Fine._ You can just sit outside and _camp_ for however long it takes us.” She disappeared down the hall and into the kitchen. Barry sighed and slumped against the wall, closing his eyes.

Lucretia took a few tentative steps toward him. “...Barry?”

“I should go apologize,” he murmured. “I'll...I'll go with you guys. It's just...”

“It's been hard.”

He nodded. “I didn't realize how much I was putting onto them, you know? Like I hadn't even noticed, but I was...I was letting them be something they never signed up for.”

“It's alright--”

“It's _not._ It's not Lup's fault that I...I _lost_ my parents. And it's not Merle and Davenport's fault that I just put all these weird feelings onto them. It's _not._ ” He shook his head. “It's all stupid.”

“It isn't stupid, Barry. You were looking for something and they helped you find it. I did the same thing.”

He looked at her. “...Yeah?”

“Yes. Davenport and I...look I've been alone a long time, and he was just so familiar I...” She shook her head. “I can't pretend to know exactly what you're feeling, but I think I have some idea.”

For the first time in weeks, Barry smiled. “I think you know more than you think you do.” He stepped closer. “Can I...can I give you a hug?” Lucretia nodded. Barry closed the space and wrapped his arms around her, holding on tight. He sighed as he pulled back. “I should go talk to Lup.”

“I'll go make sure Magnus is coherent.”

“Good plan,” Barry said, and gave her another smile.

 

* * *

 

They found the light, after some bumpy flying from Magnus. He landed a little crooked, but proud, and they loaded it onto the ship.

“Should I take us back?”

Taako, still a little green, shook his head quickly. “ _No._ We're uh, we're good here, homie.”

“Oh. Okay!” Magnus hopped down from the controls and stretched. “I'm gonna go for a run, anyone else wanna come with me?”

Lup glanced at Taako and shook her head. “No, we'll stay here.”

Barry raised a tentative hand. “Um, I'll go. I guess. I don't run, like, ever. I'm super outta shape – _oof!_ ” He stumbled as Magnus gave him a hardy pat on the back.

“Great! I'll keep pace with ya, it won't be a big deal.”

Lup frowned. “Are you sure you two wanna go out there alone? I mean...something on this planet...killed Merle and Dav. We shouldn't take another risk.”

“We'll be fine!” Magnus stretched. “I'm gonna go get my shoes.”

Lucretia sighed. “Maybe we should all go.”

“No.” Barry shook his head. “We can't...be afraid to be ourselves. We have to keep going. We have to keep...keep living.” He looked at Lup. “I shouldn't have shouted at you today. You were just trying to show me that, and I was...I let everything I was feeling cloud my judgment.”

Lup shrugged. “You're a person, Barold. You're allowed to be upset.”

“Yeah, but I didn't want to make you--”

“It's fine,” she said quickly. “Go running with Mags, I think he could use the company.”

Taako nodded. “We'll stay here and make dinner,” he said, and grabbed Lup by the arm and pulled her away.

Magnus came in, shoes laced and hair pushed back with a sweatband. “Lu, you comin'?”

“I need to--”

“To write, yeah.” Magnus sniffed. “Sure. Stay and write. S'important.” He nudged Barry. “Go get your sneaks, dude, let's do this.”

 

* * *

 

The weeks passed. Barry and Magnus would run together, Lucretia would write, and the twins – the twins were always close, but without Merle and Davenport around they seemed to be completely inseparable. Almost indistinguishable from one another. Lucretia drew them a lot that cycle – from behind while they stood in the kitchen, from her spot in the sitting room while they twisted together like pretzels, reading out loud or softly to one another.

She drew the spaces where their stand-in parents would have been, and felt infinitely young under the starscape above them.

One evening she lay on the outside deck, staring up, when someone stepped toward her. “You okay?” Magnus asked, lowering himself down to her side.

“Yeah. I'm okay.” She reached for his hand without thinking. Her brother, her partner in crime through these last years. “I'm getting better.”

“It's been hard,” he agreed and stretched out next to her. “Lup said she and Taako...they lost their folks when they were kids. They had their aunt for a while, but...”

“I lost my mother,” Lucretia said.

“Yeah. Guess we all unlocked our tragic backstories this year, huh?” He grinned at her. “I never knew my parents. Dunno what they looked like. Guess I just figured...this was it, you know? As far as family went. Couldn't have expected all the dying.”

“We seem to excel at it.”

“Yeah, well, we're living in unusual times.” Magnus squeezed her hand. “They'll be back soon.”

“And then another year. What if we lose someone and...and it doesn't reset? What if we finally find somewhere, and--”

“Hey. Don't do that. You'll mess yourself up thinking that way.”

“I can't help it,” she said, and curled up against him. “Will you try harder to stay with us?”

“...Yeah. Yeah, of course. Is that what you want?”

She nodded. “You're my brother, Magnus. You're my family. All of us...that's it for each other. We need to stay as safe as we can.”

Magnus wrapped an arm around her and pulled her close. “Alright,” he said. “I promise.”

 

* * *

 

As soon as the year reset, Merle and Davenport were besieged by their crew.

“ _Can't. Breathe!_ ” Merle choked. “You kids knock it off!”

“We missed you!” Magnus said. “Aw man, it was crazy here without you guys. I learned to fly the ship!”

Davenport raised a brow and looked toward Lucretia, who shook her head quickly. “Wow, good for you Magnus!”

Lup pointed. “Barry shouted at me and then he apologized. We did conflict resolution without you two, and we were very, _very_ good at it.”

Davenport looked to Lucretia again, but this time she only shrugged. “Oh! Well, good for you guys!”

Taako nudged Merle in the ribs. “Bet you two have lots to talk about, now that you died together. Big thing to have in common. Might bring you two olds closer together.”

“I am not _old_ ,” Davenport muttered.

“Older than us.”

“ _Ugh_.” He threw his hands up and headed toward the cockpit. “I'm not dealing with this.”

“Wait!” Magnus ran after him. “Show me how to land, I did really bad at that--”

Lucretia bent down and hugged Merle. “I took care of your plants,” she said.

“Oh, well thanks, Lu.”

She nodded. “Of course.”

“Yeah, but she didn't hit on them, so who knows how they're doing,” Lup said, giving Lucretia a wink. She felt herself go red.

Merle laughed. “Well, I'll go check on 'em. Hey, I'm glad you kids did okay while we were...while we were gone.”

Taako nodded. “Yeah, we were totally fine. No emotional scarring occurred whatsoever.”

“Great!” Merle grinned and headed toward his room. After he was gone, Taako visibly deflated.

“Fuck me.”

“I know,” Lup said.

“Seriously, are we gonna do this shit every fuckin' time?”

“Yes,” Lup said, kissing his temple. “Come on, let's go make some dinner.”

“Yeah, yeah, alright.” Taako threw a look over his shoulder at Lucretia and gave her a smile. “Hey, come help?”

“Me?”

“No, the other mousey artist we have living on this ship. Yes, you. Come on, I'm starved.”

Lucretia smiled. She needed to write, honestly. She needed to make notes and plans, but – her family was together again.

The journals could wait.

 

* * *

 

_**suffering as I suffer you  
** _ _**(magnus & lucretia)** _

“ _I'm afraid.” Lucretia clutched Magnus's hand, her other still clenching her blouse, trying to stop the bleeding. “Magnus, I'm scared--”_

“ _It's okay. It's okay.” He held her closer, leaned down and kissed her forehead. “I won't leave you. Okay? I won't go.”_

“ _You have to, you can make it out--”_

“ _No,” he said. “I can't.”_

_Lucretia swallowed. “...Oh.”_

“ _It's fine. We'll be together and it'll be fine.”_

_She nodded. “Does it hurt?”_

“ _To die? No, not really. I mean sometimes the before hurts, the part that gets you there.” He ran a hand through her hair. “You'll be okay.”_

“ _Alright.” She smiled. “I trust you.”_

_She took one more breath, and she went still in his arms. Magnus held her closer._

_The ceiling cave began to crack and –_

 

* * *

 

Merle gasped, tumbling forward. Barry rushed to catch him. “You okay?”

“Yeah. Yeah, I just...we don't always get a chance to do that.”

“Was it the cave?” Lup was pacing in front of the bodies, wringing her hands. “It was the cave, wasn't it?”

“She bled out. Got attacked by something. Magnus stayed behind.”

Taako swore. “Big dumb animal.” He nudged Magnus's boot. “He'd fucking move mountains for her, of course he stayed behind.” He shook his head. “Shit. This _sucks._ ”

Barry stood. He didn't like this anymore than anyone else, but he also didn't like looking at Magnus and Lucretia, laid out under the moonlight. “We need to do something with the bodies. They can't stay like this.”

“Pyre,” Davenport said. “Like usual.”

“Fine.” Barry glanced down, tried not to look at their faces.

_Infinitely young, forty years of living and still they were kids, they were children, they were –_

“Barry?” Lup watched him. “Come on, we're gonna get everything together.”

“Yeah, just...just give me a minute.”

Lup nodded and went to him, wrapping her arms around him. “I'm sorry about Team Human,” she said quietly. “I know how much they mean to you.”

Barry held her back. “It was dangerous to go down there, they knew that. They knew...they knew the risks.”

“Yeah, still.” Lup pulled back. “It sucks.” She turned and followed her brother.

Barry looked down at the bodies. “Yeah, it really does.”

 

* * *

 

It started around cycle ten. Lucretia and Magnus just got closer. They were so close in age, and Barry must have felt worlds away from them. He could have been their dad, an uncle, a weird older brother.

“That's what you are,” Magnus had told him. “You're our weird older brother.”

“And that makes you--”

“Twins separated by birth and thirty-nine months,” Lucretia said, not looking up from her spell book. “We did the math.”

“Lucretia did the math. I just always wanted a sister.” He took a jar of peanut butter and a spoon.

“Magnus, don't eat that.”

He scowled. “You don't have to take the job so seriously.”

Lucretia finally looked up and sighed. “Well share, at least,” she said and went to get a spoon of her own.

 

* * *

 

“ _He doesn't take this seriously! He thinks he's not important, he thinks it's, like, his purpose to die out there, and I don't know how to tell him that without him thinking that I'm angry about it--”_

“ _You are angry about it,” Barry said. “Look, Lucretia, if you want Magnus to be careful, just ask him to be careful. You're a sister to him, he loves you.” Barry stood and put a hand on either of her shoulders to stop her pacing. “He'd do it for you.”_

_Lucretia swallowed. “I just...I don't want to push him away. I haven't had family in so long, I never had a brother--”_

“ _This is what families do for one another. They want each other to be safe.” Barry pulled her in and kissed her forehead. “And if I have to be your weird older brother in this scenario, then I'm gonna tell you. Talk to Magnus. It'll work out better if you do.”_

_She nodded. “Okay. Okay, thanks. I'll do that when he's back. I'll...I'll tell him.”_

 

* * *

 

Lup sighed. “Who's writing this year down then?”

“The journals need to be fed information when Lucretia's not around. We still have to tell it certain things. Like when Merle and Davenport come back with the light, they'll tell the journal where they found it, how they found it. If we want it to know what we're saying, I'd have to go get it, and we'd have to talk around it and--”

“Okay, we get it, Lucretia's a smarty pants and her journals are smart, too.” Taako leaned back on the couch. “Guess we'll have to see if Merle and Davenport will tell it whether or not they got it on in the woods.”

Lup snorted. “Yeah, you're not gonna get that out of either of them.”

The talk grew quiet. Every noise the ship made seemed to grow louder in the silence.

Taako sighed. “I miss the kids.”

“Yeah.”

“I haven't made fun of Magnus's crappy beard in days.”

“Yes,” Lup said dryly. “What a tragedy for you.”

Taako scowled and stood. “I'm gonna go bake a cake so we can tell Magnus we made one and ate it all in one sitting.”

Barry laughed as he went, leaving him alone with Lup. She reached over and tentatively took his hand. “I'm okay,” he said.

“It's alright if you aren't. It sucks to lose both of them at once.”

“I know,” he said. “But I can't...I can't dwell on it. They'll be back.”

“You can admit that your heart hurts a little,” she said quietly.

Barry nodded. He looked down where their fingers touched. “My heart hurts a lot,” he said. “You think we're getting older but really we're...we're not. It's just us moving around in a circle and they're still kids. I caught them seeing who could shove the most marshmallows in their mouths the other day.”

“Who won?”

“It was a draw, actually.”

Lup laughed. Her fingers twisted with his more, until it was almost painful and he realized – she was crying.

“Hey, _hey._ ”

“I'm sorry.”

“No, it's fine, what's the matter?”

“I just--” She scrubbed a hand over her cheek. “I fucking hate watching this happen. When you were gone last year, Magnus was a wreck, he missed you so much. And I was...I--” She took a breath. “I just don't want to watch anyone suffer anymore.”

“We can't stop that until we figure out how to stop this.”

Lup stood, dropping his hand. “Then we need to figure it out. I don't want to lose anyone again.” She left him there and went into the kitchen.

This wouldn't be the last time they lost anyone, or even the last time they lost Magnus or Lucretia, but – it would be the last time Barry accepted it.

He started working harder to figure out how to make this stop.

(he hated seeing lup cry)

 

* * *

 

He hated seeing his captain cry, too. Davenport didn't know he was there. He wouldn't have been so raw in front of Barry, but he could let his guard down with Merle like he could with no one else. Barry stood, back pressed to the wall trying not to make a sound –

“--not your fault.”

“They're _children_ , Merle.”

“They knew what this was going to be about.”

“No,” Davenport snapped. “None of us knew. How could we have _ever_ known? I asked him to be careful. I asked him not to throw his life away--”

“Magnus made his choice to stay, he didn't want her to be alone. She was scared.”

“I can't protect any of you.” Davenport's voice shook. “I can't protect you, I've failed you all--”

“You haven't. You can't help when this happens--”

“ _I am your captain!_ I'm supposed to make sure you _make it._ This was not supposed to be the protocol. Me _weeping_ in my cabin is not fucking _protocol_.”

“Screw protocol. You're alive, you have a damn beating heart, let it _bleed_ \--”

“Get out.”

Merle sighed. “Dav--”

“I said _get out._ ”

Barry moved as fast as possible before one of them found him. He didn't need to have that particular conversation.

 

* * *

 

Barry wasn't prepared for how much it _hurt_ to see them again. He'd lit their pyres, shut the doors to their rooms, mourned for them and now –

“ _Weird brother!_ ” Magnus lifted him up and spun him around, and Lucretia threw herself at them both.

“Team Human's back in the game,” Taako said. “Hey Magnus, you want to make an entire cake and eat it?”

“ _Yes._ ”

“We already did that, tough shit!”

“You're a _jackass_ \--”

Davenport whistled. “Alright, _alright!_ We have a ship to land on another plane so I need everyone ready for whatever. And let's uh.” He sniffed. “Let's all stick together for a while, alright?”

Merle nodded. “I like that idea. Everyone agree?”

“Sure.”

“Yeah.”

“We'll do our best!”

“Okay then.” Davenport straightened his jacket. “Let's do what we do best.”

 

* * *

 

_**hearing you speak of pain  
** _ _**(after)** _

They had to grow, those years.

Barry would never let the death of his teammates rattle him again, not until his own somewhere around cycle fifty-three. Lup told him later that he and Merle were both gone that year, and the ship seemed...rough without them. Everyone grew a little sharper, danced a little closer along that knife's edge.

“You're so warm,” she'd murmured. “You make us all a little softer.”

Barry went red, but it made him feel better all the same.

There was a year they lost Davenport and Lucretia. Magnus tried to forget that he'd held Lucretia in his arms and watched her die twice, tried to forget that the second time she left him behind. It wasn't fair to feel what he felt. It wasn't fair to think she should have tried harder – how many times had he died? How many times had he left his team?

How many times did she ask him to stop? To be _careful?_

(later, it would be a memory magnus felt blessed to have lost)

 

* * *

 

When Merle learned to parley, death became...regular. To go for months without him was almost normal for a while, though never absolute. Davenport bristled in his absence, Taako seemed to sour – they were all a little less when someone was missing, but without Merle, the humor seemed to go. They just couldn't laugh as much.

The cycles without Taako were unbearable. The years without Lup were dark. The years without Magnus were quiet. The years without Lucretia were dull.

They were a _family_ , and when one was missing, they were unsettled, and incomplete.

That it became normal was perhaps the most painful thing of all.

 

* * *

 

And when the years came after they remembered, after they were whole again – the losses became real.

You see, when someone dies, there is never really a perfect way to forget them. They leave parts of themselves behind without thought. Lup and Barry managed to find a way around it – but Taako would outlive them all, and one by one, they all had to say goodbye.

Over the years – the decades, and then the centuries – he collected parts of them. Magnus's favorite coffee mug had a place in his kitchen. Lucretia's favorite chair found its way into his house. He took a start from one of Merle's rose bushes and cultivated them for years. Davenport's spyglass had a place on his shelf.

(even angus had to go, and his divination book found its way onto taako's bedside table)

And in the end, all of those things became part of Taako himself, and it was Kravitz who catalogued them, stored them away so they might preserve the memory of the family he'd been absorbed into.

A solitary pointed hat hung by the door of their home, and though life allowed Kravitz the pleasure and privilege of seeing his beloved in the years that passed – the hat held a certain fondness, and Kravitz would reach out and hold it, sometimes even wear it just for a moment.

Eventually, Lup brought by a red umbrella, and next to it, Barry hung an IPRE robe.

It was a photo without faces, and it said more than any story could.

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> lyrics and title from "blood i bled" by the staves.  
> tumblr @ weatheredlaw


End file.
